


Trials

by Ideal_Flower



Category: Homeland
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-30
Updated: 2016-10-30
Packaged: 2018-08-28 01:28:16
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 332
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8425393
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ideal_Flower/pseuds/Ideal_Flower
Summary: 333 words of pumpkins and moroseness. LJ Halloween prompt.





	

**Trials**

Her copper curls were damp, one seed stuck to a fat cheek as she stared down at her hands, gripping the pumpkin tightly, trying to carve a crooked smile with the child-sized knife that he had spent two hours agonizing over in the seasonal aisle at Walgreens. 

His own pumpkin sat, uncarved, in the spread of newspaper coating the hardwood floor. 

He saw _him_ in her. It was sometimes easy to miss, with her blue eyes and Mathison giggle. But then she would be refused a second cookie or a proper bedtime, and she would stomp her foot and glare at him with an unnerving similarity.

The pumpkin dropped from her hands to the floor with a bit of a thud, and she sighed heavily, but lightly, as only a child could sigh. The jack-o’-lantern was missing an eye, and he watched as she carefully drew on the other crooked triangle with one of the many washable markers that filled her playbox. It was astounding, how many toys one child could have. This child would know no hardship - not in any tangible way - only in the ghost of a father. 

She looked up at him suddenly, pointing one pumpkin-goopy finger at his own forgotten squash. “Aren’t you gonna carve it? Tomorrow’s Halloween!” 

He smiled at her, his heart aching in a way that was so different than what he felt for her mother, but yet somehow so similar. His fingers trembled, and he had to think a little too hard before he could get his left arm to move, to lift his hand to her cheek and pluck the seed from her skin. He tossed it with the rest, piled neatly in the centre of their newspaper raft. 

“Of course I am,” he replied, although he couldn’t keep his hands still enough to brush his teeth, much less chisel a grin onto the small pumpkin beside him. 

But he didn’t. And when they were called to supper, it still sat, waiting.

**Author's Note:**

> Now go eat your feelings with all that 'leftover' Halloween fun-sized chocolate you just happen to have.


End file.
